"Who says it's a man?" The man from Sekhar must have stolen his voice from a frog. "Looks more like a purple egg to me."

"Eggs have yolk inside," the other Outie said. "That thing's solid rock."

"Twoo, twl'oo!" the Jarp whistled in great hilarity. The orange creature went off into a string of bird-sounds no one could understand.

Jesti burned. He started angrily for the prisoners. Roughly, one of the guards shoved him back. Yahna Golden clutched his arm.

"Are you mad? Those are pirates, prisoners! TGW brought them in for local trial this morning."

The pirates were still whooping, laughing, sneering. "That's right, Goldie!" an Outie yelled over his shoulder. "Look after that poor li'l bug. He's bruised purple already! I mean-lookit that big lump on his shoulders!"

More hilarity, while the guards shoved him and the other prisoners through a doorway into the building Jesti had just quitted.

'Pirates." Yahna Golden shuddered. "What can they do but laugh? They're dead already."

29.Jesti stuffed the pa.s.s into a pocket and turned away without so much as the "uh" of standard acknowledgment.

"I got the pa.s.s for you," she said, and it sounded more plea than reminder.

Jesti swung back, eyes blazing. "You got the pa.s.s for me!" The words exploded out, sneering. "Oh how wonderful of you! I kiss the ground before your bless-ed feet!"

The golden-haired woman's nostrils flared. Her eyes distended. "You shout at me? Without me, you'd still be a prisoner!''

"Without you, I'd still have my hair-my brain!"

Her face turned a lighter olive as blood drained and anger-muscles quivered at the corners of her mouth. "I had no choice and you must know it. When the Crozers asked my help, they said you'd murdered that wh.o.r.e. All the evidence was against you. It's in their favor that they were willing to have me run a brain-drain as a final check. I was on my way to a party-it was my favor to you that I agreed to do it."

"Favor! A pulse-palp reader for Queen t.i.tsy's holo-mellers? Save your favors and push 'em right up your haughty nose, witch-daktari!"

That did it. Her eyes went both icy and hot. As if Sekhar's too-close sun were blazing through Iceworld's frozen tundras. Her fists clenched until that gilded middle nail stood out like a dagger poised for his heart.

"You-you Eilan! You dare question my competence? Me?-reader at the Psychesorium of Koba, with three silver medullas from the T-SA!"

"s.h.i.t! You stripped my mind, Lyonese! You raped my brain!"

"Eilan-Jesti. I had to do it. I didn't know why you'd come here, what had happened. About you, the Elders; all the trouble on Eilong. Besides, all that counts is that you're cleared now, free-"

She went on, practically babbling. Jesti couldn't hear the words. They were chaff against the tempest of his fury. The shame, the pain, the outrage-all surged into a desire to hurt, to murder. This so-cool woman with all her curves, her beckoning lips and eyes with their slow sideward 30.glances, her costumed posturings like some wet dream from a holomeller . . . ! He hated her.

"You stripped me bare, raped my brain! Durga and Kali curse you!"

A mask seemed to glide into place. "Right then," she said. "Let this be an end to it. I've never humbled myself to a man before. I don't know why I tried this time."

"Wrong," he snarled, staring dark and menacing into her eyes. "It will never be an end. It's your game so far, Lyonese. Next turn is mine. This time, you raped my brain. But before my hair grows back, may I rot in Shiva's private h.e.l.l if I don't rape your body!"

3.

Not all thieves wait for the night.

-Ifrim ofResh The Handsome Man, Pearl had named him. He had a name; it was Gel Gelor. He stood on the shuttle viewdeck far from Croz-high above planet Samanna, in fact. Gel Gelor was a study in physical perfection. Profile regular to a fault, black ringlets crisp and glossy, teeth glistening white against the rich brown of his skin. And the rich brown baritone of a voice.

That exterior was a mask. The euphoria and vaulting sense of power he had felt in those final, thrashing moments while Pearl died had ebbed now, dropped away into a bottomless depression. Turmoil seethed within him and verged on panic. How could he have been such a fool as to challenge CongCorp's might and fling himself thus into the face of fate?

Yet even as he raised the question, Gelor knew the answer. There was a limit to how long a man could tolerate sneers and snickers, the mockery of those who worked with him in the central compudator banks, men and women alike. Self-a.s.surance and swagger were gifts he lacked. From the very moment of birth he had seemed destined for the world of intellect: a scholar. A deviant 31.32.scholar, perhaps, forever probing the far-out, the outre, the bizarre.

If only his colleagues could have understood! But no; one and all, they combined to put him down. That was the crime beyond forgiveness. No one questioned his skill as a compudator, but what did that matter when females mocked him as dull and found him tongue-tied?

The final blow had come from Nijah. He still remembered in churning bitterness the way she'd laughed, her red lips mocking him: "Handsome is as handsome doesn't."

It had been the ultimate insult. He was still glad he'd killed her.

At the time it had been different. For days, weeks of hours he had writhed in horror-almost-panic, certain that his crime would be discovered and the ultimate penalty exacted.

That had not happened. Nijah's death had been attributed to some druggy crewman off a departing s.p.a.cer. No one had given a second thought to the idea that it might be Gel Gelor who was guilty.

He had learned a lesson from the crime: stick with husts. Avoid girls who mock and laugh-and avoid real women altogether] The trouble was that husts cost money. Especially those on a level that could arouse him. A compudator's pay didn't buy much. Yet a compudator had access to other sources of revenue. Sources such as the wealth of CongCorp itself, stellar creds beyond imagining. When a compudator was' skilled enough, he could even manipulate the banks a bit and even conceal his defalcations.

Sooner or later that sort of theft must have an end. Gelor knew that. So it was that his larger dream was born. His dream of a coup that would put him beyond even mighty CongCorps grasp and vengeance. At first conception, it had seemed madness. Then, as he pondered and delved and blocked in angles, excitement had begun to surge in him.

Ultimately he had come to know that there'd be no living with himself unless he made the gamble-for enormous stakes.

Long weeks of planning followed. An application for 33.leave time was freely granted because of his long record of reliability and duty, loyalty. Ah, the sensation of triumph! At last he was on his way, off to Croz. And there the preposterous wonderful luck of coming upon a stupid, stranded Eilan, rather than having to transship to Eilong itself.

Finally, the bonus of that hust called Pearl. The paroxysmal spasm of ecstasy exploding in him while she writhed and thrashed and died, died while he pulled the lech-noose tighter, tighter.

Now the last embers of that blazing murder-pa.s.sion were cold and dead. It was time for the next step. The escalation his plan demanded, here on Samanna.

And so Gelor stood on the liftoff viewdeck: poised and handsome without, panic-quivering within. Of all steps in his plan, this one was surely most vital. Yet he had little idea as to how to go about it. A scholar's mind and a background iff compudating had given him no background for it.

No matter! He dared not falter on his own timidity! Crossing to the viewport, he stared down at Samanna, at the s.p.a.ceport area called Riverview.

It was as the edutapes had described it: a crowded yet attractive city, cl.u.s.tered along a lovely broad and winding river. Only it was not a river, but a geo-topographical anomaly. A ribbon-like strip of green sand that stretched down from the distant hills, remnant of some quirk of a long-ago geologic age.

The city itself also somehow captured the spirit of another period, another age, with its jumbled domes and spires and minarets. Of course it also preserved the sewers and cul-de-sacs and alleys of an earlier day, complete with riffraff and cutthroats gathered here from the usual wide spread of other planets.

Riffraff, cutthroats, and . . . the crober. He disliked the slang for an ancient and proud scientific skill, born before the settling of the galaxy: microbiology. The (mi)crober, DeyMeox, famed from one arm of the galaxy to the other With her and Samanna's sc.u.m to help me, Gelor thought, I'll yet avenge all insults-and be rich into the bargain!

34.Precisely what he wanted . . . and the thought terrified him. At this very moment his palms were sweating.

That realization moved him to swift action. If there was anything he could not afford, it was to allow his resolution to seep away in trepidation. Panic was his constant companion, and he must continue to fight it. He strode to the shuttleport, head held high, and stepped onto the first car down.

In Riverview at last, he asked directions to the old quarter. In a few mins he was pa.s.sing through an arch that resembled an onion, uprooted and inverted. The streets beyond were narrow and twisty, uneven underfoot. The odor grew appalling. Grimly, trying to hold his breath against the stench, Gelor moved deeper and deeper into the maze.

Ahead, an open doorway belched forth strange music, mixed with a rumble of voices shot with laughter. Obvious sounds; evocative sounds. In bars, over the centuries only the sound of tinkling gla.s.ses had been replaced by quieter pla.s.s. Gelor approached.

He looked into a downer dive. s.p.a.cefarers from half a dozen planets cl.u.s.tered at one end. Fighting down his nervousness, Gelor put on what he hoped was a bold front, entered, and took a place at the end of the bar closest to the door. A bartender with a scarred jaw came to meet him.

"Yours?"

"I'm new, just in." Gelor forced a smile. "What's local?"

The barman reached down one of a dozen hanging tubes and filled a pla.s.s from it. He had a hand the size of an arctic mitten. "Zopa. Straight Samannish. No other planet's got Zopa.''

Gelor took a tentative taste and managed not to grimace. He had no trouble understanding why this stuff was strictly local. No other planet would want it. Should've ordered a beer, a Sam(annish) Grolz. "Great," he got out. He moved the pla.s.s to and fro on the bar in erratic cyma recta curves. "Where do I go for a good time?"

"Husts?"

35."What else?"

The barman refilled the pla.s.s, unfortunately. "With that face, you'd do better on yer own."

"Who's got the time? Besides, I like . . . special. Strangles. Freakos."

The barman snorted. "You call it, Sam husts got it." His face screwed up while he pondered. "Wait a min." He moved off down the bar.

Gelor relaxed a little. Making a show of taking another drink of the Zopa, he half-listened to the blaring music.

The barman was talking to someone in a clot of s.p.a.cefarers. After a moment, a man-yellow-sashed and surely a Reshi, then-stepped free of the noisy drinkers. He came toward Gelor, A fierce-looking specimen with a heavy, turned-up moustache, he wore a sleeveless jacket that showed off bulging muscles and only half-concealed a knife. His dirty orange turban was stained in places with something that looked suspiciously like blood.

"So." An ugly guttural. "You want fresh meat."

Gelor nodded. He didn't trust his voice to remain steady if he spoke.

"Specials. Freaky stuff, huh. You want that kind of slice, it costs." He watched Gelor nod. "Right, then. Come on."

Gelor let the man from Resh lead him out of the bar. A hundred paces later, the Reshi turned into an even narrower alley. Gelor smelled vomit.

Desperately he said, "Hold on. I mean, I want something special. Really special." His voice shook, the way he'd feared it would, but he didn't dare follow any farther without setting up his point.

The Reshi paused, scowling. "What kind of special?"

Gelor's throat rasped, it was so dry. "TZ special. I want a woman who's on TZ."

The Reshi stared. "I won't repeat that aloud. You're on the blank, jacko. What hust's going to hold still for a mind-wipe?"

"Don't worry about that-I'll find my own hust. What I want's TZ. A good full pak of it. Get it for me and I'll 36.make it worth your while, plus." He was fumbling out stells as he spoke. "See? I've got the cred."

The Reshi's face might have been carved from crysplas, for all the expression it showed. "That's something I don't deal in." His hand flashed up to catch Gelor by the shoulder. He spun him about till he faced down the alley. "Hust's got a bed-shed three doors along. Wild one. She'll do anything you want. Young, too. You name it." A shove sent Gelor staggering along the alley. Frantically he threw up his hands to break his fall if he should trip or slip in vomit. Only then, as he twisted, he glimpsed the other man. With a shock, he saw the bare head. The orange turban was looped between ham-like hands.

Next instant the twisted cloth whipped down over his head, around his throat. He was jerked backward, more than ever off balance. The Reshi's beer-reeking voice rasped: "Hoy! You don't need stells, fella-not for no hust ner no TZ neither. Me, I'll hold that wad for you."

A hand clawed loose Gelor's cred-pouch. Another shove thrust him forward with such violence that slammed his head into a wall. Stunned, he slumped on his face in the alley's filth. He was only dimly aware of the thuds of running feet and the echo of the Reshi's laughter.

How long he lay there Gel Gelor never knew. Seconds only, perhaps. Long enough for his belly to knot with shame and fury. And for humiliation-devastating, all-engulfing-to flame through him. So much for genius! So much for plans. They left a man in an alley flat on his face, eating s.h.i.t and old vomit.

Was this what they'd meant, those who had laughed so at him? Was this the final meaning behind that "Handsome is as handsome doesn't" line? Am I really destined to endure humiliation and contempt forever?

Slowly, he pulled himself up from the slime and the dreck. For a long while he sat, back against the urine-redolent wall, staring numbly into the grimy gloom. When finally he struggled to his feet, he was shaking. Not so much from pain or weakness, now, as in wrenching fury.

Clumsily, he groped inside his jacket to the secret pocket pinned there. It was still there and intact. So was the bulk 37.of his stells intact, then, in local paper. Gelor sighed. At least he hadn't been stupid enough to trust all his funds to the pouch!

Unfortunately he still had no TZ. Without tetrazombase his plan was still only a vaporous mind-thing. Soon now, too, giant CongCorp would be on his trail and hunting hard for him-if the company ruffos weren't already.

It was a thought to bring chills to a const.i.tution stouter than Gelor's. He had no choice now, no choice but to go on. He remembered what that slaver Jonuta was supposed to have said: You can't keep a bad man down. And the first step still called for a supply of tetrazombase. TZ.

Where to turn?

He brooded on that for a long moment. The answer became obvious. The treacherous Reshi had given him the clue.

Allegedly, a "wild bust who'd do anything a man paid for'' worked behind the third door down this alley. Staring at nothing, Gelor nodded. Husts he knew how to handle. With a knife at her throat, she might even find some of the enslaving drug called tetrazombase.

Swiftly now, he brushed the worst of the alley's dreck from his clothes. Groping, he dug a credbill from his cache. It was a big one. Gelor straightened to his full height and strode down the alley. He knocked at the third door.

It opened a sem, after a moment. A dark eye peered at him. Gelor held the stell-note before that heavily kohl-ringed eye. "A Reshi sent me."

Promptly, the door opened wider. A lot wider. She was hardly a girl but hardly old, either. She gestured him inside. Her lips glowed red as only subcutane could make them. Her scarlet strip-dress matched.

She closed the door behind him. The red lips twisted in a sulky, taunting smile. Slender fingers reached out to caress him.

So she liked the direct approach. Gelor gave it to her. He kicked her in the stomach. The wind went but of her in an agonized gust. Clutching her belly, she doubled over. Purple-dyed hair fell forward.

38.Gelor shoved her backward. She sprawled onto the floor. Really superb legs, he noted, art-deco'd in multicolored arabesquerie.

He spoke coldly: "If you want to live, you'll do what I tell you."

Making vomitous sounds, she clawed her way up onto one elbow. Choking. Face averted. If she heard his words, she gave no indication of it.

"What I want," he said, pacing the words, "is tetra-zombase. Where do I get it-TZ?"

Her head came up. Still panting, still gagging and hurting, she stared at him. Pretty face, he thought-and stupid. He pushed: "Where!"

Still no answer. He drew back his foot.

She brought up a shielding hand. "What-what is it- you want?"

He held her eyes with his and p.r.o.nounced it exaggeratedly: "T . . . Z."

She caught her breath. Her eyes distended. "Neg!"

"Grat-s.h.i.t!" Deliberately, he poised his foot for another kick.

"Neg, please!" This time it was the kick she protested, rather than his demand. "I-I swear ... I know nothing of TZ." She paused, quaking and uneasy. "There-there is a Saipese. Sometimes he ships with slavers ..."